Every step, every breath, we're conscious of it."Strangely both walkers fiercely deny that they are danger junkies "We're not addicted to the rush," Mr Kindar-Martin said. "I don't even drive fast."However, he added that balance is a "magical thing". There are so many people in the world who flow through their lives They don't pay attention and they're not really there But we're not just existing, we're actually living. My wife is a little bit afraid but I don't want to think about falling."Mr Kindar-Martin, 23, began learning circus skills at a summer camp in the United States when he was 14. Like Mr Pasquette he insists that nothing would ever deter him from pursuing his chosen occupation "Either I die or I don't," he said airily "I see this as my life I know I wouldn't feel complete if I stopped.

"When I'm up there my goal is to get from one point to another. "You need to be vigilant and ready for the unexpected," Mr Pasquette said. Yet falling off the wire is a prospect that neither of them give much consideration to. They have erected in a cornfield a similarly sized wire which they estimate will take 45 minutes for them to cross.Within sight of a nuclear power station, poplar trees swaying in the breeze, they contemplate their potential place in history. "Getting a record isn't my interest," Mr Pasquette, 29, said. "Walking a tightrope is something really special - you can't know until you've done it." A former member of the Archeos circus he has been wire-walking since he was 17 and in 1991 walked a rope strung between the twin towers of Wembley Stadium, north-west London.Both performers have identical scars on their shoulders where, in separate incidents, their tricks have backfired. In fact, the distinction of the first successful crossing belongs to a woman, Madame Genevieve After two attempts she finally succeeded in 1861.

A writer at the time described it taking place "in the light of the declining sun, her gold-broidered dress and white pole gleaming refulgently".During this century a Frenchman, Charles Elleano, in 1951 and a German, Franz Burbach in 1972 have also pulled it off.In the village of Trainel in the Champagne area near Paris Mr Pasquette and Mr Kindar-Martin are making their final preparations for the attempt a week on Sunday which will launch the annual Thames Festival. In 1859 he walked across Niagara Falls but although he settled in London he never attempted to cross the river. If they are successful, the pair will win themselves a place in the Guinness Book of Records. If not they could plunge into the water at approximately 60mph to almost certain death. Appropriately 1997 is the centenary of the death of the most famous wire- walker ever, Gravelet, better known as Blondin. All being well, Didier Pasquette, a Frenchman, and Jade Kindar-Martin, an American, will cross each other in the middle, one continuing towards the Oxo tower on London's South Bank, one to Victoria Embankment. JIt is possibly an act of utter madness.

In today's overwhelmingly safety conscious climate, two men are intending to walk across a tightrope suspended 150ft above the River Thames Without a safety net. We are talking to a whole range of people about the long- term use of the site."He said that a major sports centre run by the English Sports Council was a more likely option, but an exhibition centre was also being considered.. Ironically, the scheme's backers said they regarded National Lottery money as the most appropriate source of such funding.Andrew Hawkins, director of policy at the London Chamber of Commerce, said King's Cross was a more suitable site for a convention centre than Greenwich."The most important criterion ought to be whether the convention centre would be commercially viable once it is up and running," he said."People will want their accommodation close to the convention centre and would have the West End on their doorstep, whereas there are some serious transport issues if you were to base it at Greenwich."But Ross Cook, of the New Millennium Experience company, which is running the Greenwich project, said: "A convention centre is an idea that has been mooted. The scheme, if it went ahead, would be completed by 2004.David Edwards of Ove Arup, consultants to the project, said that pounds 50m in public money was likely to be needed in addition to the pounds 100m expected from private developers. Barges would pass beneath the warehouse carrying grain which was stored in the building for distribution around the country.The warehouse would form the entrance to the larger convention site which would cover 20,000 square metres and would include 2,500 new hotel rooms. In particular, British scientists are increasingly finding themselves obliged to unveil discoveries at overseas conferences.One of the driving forces behind the King's Cross plans is the Council of Science and Technology Institutes, which represents 10,000 British scientists.The frontispiece of the new project would be the Granary Warehouse, a six-storey brick building which was built over the Regent's Canal in the last century.

The largest facility in Britain is the Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre in Glasgow which caters for 3,029 in a purpose-built hall or 11,000 using temporary seating.As the market for holding international conferences has developed, British venues have found themselves having to compete with the likes of the New Singapore Centre, which can hold 12,000 people in a single hall. A convention centre was one of the proposed options for the Greenwich site after the millennium celebrations.London business leaders are concerned that the nearest major convention centre facilities to the capital are at Lille in France, which has a 5,000- seat auditorium.By comparison, the Wembley Conference Centre, London's biggest such venue, holds only 2,700 and the Birmingham International Convention Centre holds 2,200. Some industry commentators say RJB may have to shut five of its 17 working deep mines when long-term coal contracts with the electricity generating companies come up for renewal in April next year.. A giant grain warehouse could replace the millennium dome as the site of a convention centre for London. A pounds 150m scheme was unveiled yesterday to build the 10,000-seat centre at King's Cross as supporters claimed it was a far more suitable venue than the millennium site, south of the Thames at Greenwich. The proposals, which have the backing of the Confederation of British Industry and the London Chamber of Commerce, create problems for government officials trying to find a lasting role for the millennium dome. As recently as five years ago, coal generated more than 60 per cent of UK electricity, and before then, the proportion was much higher still. The once mighty industry's prospects are worsening with a continuing flow of applications by energy companies to build new power stations fuelled by North Sea gas. Last month the nation's biggest coal mining company, RJB, announced the closure of the Asfordby ``super pit'' in Leicestershire, blaming geological problems.